Part III. Support
Teams require leaders, and constant motivation.
Personal and cancer support are most helpful to those unable to help themselves, but also to those trying to do it themselves yet wise enough to accept help from others and be grateful. The best results come from that joint effort and close personal relationships.
––John Roberts
Sometimes being strong is as simple as being supportive.
––U.S. Army Recruiting Ad, encouraging parental support.
If only caregivers had caregivers.
––Walgreen’s Advertisement
With the army focused,
The brave will not
Advance alone,
Nor will they fearful
Retreat alone.
––SunTzu, The Art of War, 6th Century B.C.
(Edited and Translated By John Minford, Penguin, 2002)
A strong support network of family and friends is consistently cited as one of the most important factors in maintaining a good quality of life. Increasingly we are recognizing the part that friendship, love, and support play in maintaining good health and in healing after an illness…People who lack intimate relationships and strong friendships, regardless of their physical health, consistently report higher rates of depression and dissatisfaction with their lives.
––Julie K. Silver, M.D., After Cancer Treatment: Heal Faster, Better, Stronger, 2006
Support from family, friends, support groups, and religious affiliations can be your strongest bulwark against disease…Depressed individuals with strong support from their loved ones did better.
––Guy McKhann, M.D. and Marilyn Albert, Ph.D.,
Keep Your Brain Young, 2002
Support is everything that helps us fight. It comes in many forms, for many purposes, from many sources. To handle this with the best result, we must arrange, control, and help in return the many forms of support that we have available or may want to seek. The positive end result of support is so extremely important to our well-being and even our survival that we must manage this in the forefront of our fight against the disease.
At first, the whole situation becomes extremely confusing, and our first duty to ourselves and those who may help or care for us in the future is to get organized so we can consider our options clearly. The realization that we have entered a war zone, and that we may die there, causes an abrupt and drastic reordering of our responsibilities, plans, and priorities. Many choices are removed, with or without our consent. Other opportunities and overriding problems present themselves. Our mental state for functioning on this dangerous battlefield is probably terrible.
Our first support duty is to recognize and foster the fact that not only do we need support, but so do the people who will support us. They may not be quite as hurt and confused as we are, but they will do their job better if we understand their needs as well as our own and help them a lot until they learn how to handle it.
Let’s put it another way and say that therapy is something to be encouraged and supported rather than feared, especially if we are anticipating consequences and side-effects that may not occur. It is easy to exaggerate this and cause more emotional disruption and lack of partnership than is realistic. Yes, at minimum it can be a bad experience and inconvenience, and at worst it can have very uncomfortable psychological and physical side effects. But, we will reduce those by being positive and informed in cooperation with our team.
When our problems are all mixed up together in our state of shock, we can’t deal with them sensibly. If we don’t get organized to deal with all the strange duties and responsibilities, our life will be a mess and we are bound to make mistakes. In dealing with cancer, we can’t afford that. We have to think clearly and make correct decisions with the help of a lot of strange information and a wide variety of people, most of whom we don’t know. Planning and organization are the only solution.
